From the UConn offense, three players to watch coming out of the midweek game against Merrimack are Briana Marcelino, Reese Guevarra and Rosie Garcia, as each had a two-hit performance on Wednesday. Marcelino leads the team in batting average, home runs, doubles, RBI and stolen bases. Along with Guevarra and Lexi Hastings (26 steals each), she leads the charge in UConn’s stolen base onslaught with a perfect 29-29 record on the season. No Husky had ever stolen 26 bases prior to this season, let alone 29. Guevarra and Garcia are currently tied for third on the team for RBI with 28 each, behind Marcelino and Jana Sanden.
This weekend, UConn travels to South Orange, New Jersey to face Seton Hall. The Pirates currently sit at 6-9 in Big East play with a 17-17 record overall, good for sixth in the conference. The Huskies have only Seton Hall and Big East No. 2 Villanova remaining in conference play, so the team is looking for a series win over the Pirates in order to put some distance between it and the Wildcats before the final weekend of the regular season.
In the circle, the Huskies rested their primary starter Elise Sokolsky against Merrimack, but Marybeth Olson and Meghan O’Neil were more than up to the task, as the duo pitched a combined one-hitter. Olson, who got the start, pitched four perfect innings and struck out nine.
The Pirates’ lineup has an almost identical team batting average to UConn’s, with both teams in the .290s, so this series is shaping up to feature solid hitting on both sides. Two players to watch for are Ashly Colonnetta and Taylor Hill, who combined for seven hits in Seton Hall’s last game, a 13-10 victory over Georgetown on April 16. Colonnetta, while only playing in 22 of Seton Hall’s 34 games this season, is batting .405. Hill on the other hand has played in every game for the Pirates, and leads the team in RBI, doubles and OPS. On top of recording three hits in Saturday’s game, she also had a six-RBI game.
Pitching-wise, Seton Hall has a primary starter in Shelby Smith, who has a 2.92 ERA on the season. Smith is coming off a complete game against Georgetown, but did give up nine earned runs, her highest total runs allowed this season.
After finishing up in South Orange, the Huskies only have two games between the Seton Hall series and the season finale series against Villanova two weeks later: A road game against Boston College on April 27, and a home matchup against St. Joseph’s on April 30.
For the UConn-Seton Hall series, first pitch in the first game is scheduled for 3 p.m. on Friday, followed by a 1 p.m. start on Saturday and a noon start on Sunday. All three games will be broadcast on FloSports.
